News

34th Annual History Conference A Success

May 4, 2009

The 34th Annual WIU History Conference, held on Saturday, May 2, was attended by more than 125 registrants, including secondary school history teachers, WIU alumni, and others interested in the study of history. It featured three morning sessions, each with four WIU History faculty presentations for conference registrants to choose among (see attached program for a complete listing of presentations).

Following lunch, conference organizer Dr. Ed Woell introduced History Department Chair, Dr. Ginny Boynton who presented the 2009 Distinguished Alumnus Award to Jim Phillips (BA 1998, MA 2000), Director of the Honors Program and tenured History Instructor at Highland College in Freeport, Illinois.

This year's Larry T. Balsamo Keynote Address was given by Dr. Orville Vernon Burton, University Distinguished Teacher/Scholar at the University of Illinois. Dr. Burton spoke on "Where and How Brown v. Board Began: Two Reconstructions and Historical Memory."

Conference registrants had gathered the prior evening at the home of University President Dr. Al Goldfarb, to honor two WIU graduate students: Roy Gully, winner of this year's David Pasquini Award, and Abby Lagemann, who was awarded the Darrell and Virginia Dykstra Graduate Scholarship for 2009-2010.